Don Baer Quotes

The best way to study about speech writing is to read great speeches.

When a man is asked to make a speech, the first thing he has to decide is what to say.

No man not inspired can make a good speech without preparation.

To make a politic speech is like being carried up a flight of steps by the pressure of a crowd.

In order to make a good speech you must have something to say and you have to believe it.

Regardless of how lyrical or rhetorically gifted they are in conveying big ideas, any candidate can do a good job of giving a speech if the goal of a speech is more than just delivering it well but achieving some end, whether it's convincing people of some issue or persuading them about you as a person.

Always, with speeches, I feel like it's an opportunity to say something.

Using rhetorical questions in speeches is a great way to keep the audience involved. Don't you think those kinds of questions would keep your attention?

We need a new stump speech.

Sustentative ideas are more important than applause lines. Substance makes speeches.

Many people can contribute suggestions to a speech, but only one person can write it.

Churchill has spent the best years of his life preparing impromptu remarks.

An orator is a man who says what he thinks and feels what he says.

Nearly every politician plagiarizes their speeches, because nearly every politician has a speech writer do the work for them.

There are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.

Speeches are not magic and there is no great speech without great policy.

Speeches are much easier if you read them. I just find when I do that, it's harder to fire up the crowd.

Most speakers speak ten minutes too long.

Ultimately, the best speakers are the ones who have put 10,000 hours into listening.

Trust me, I have never written a speech in my life, and if I have my way, I never will.

Then there was a maiden speech, so inaudible that it was doubted whether, after all, the young orator really did lose his virginity.

The bully pulpit is not an open microphone. You have to target it very carefully.

President Johnson wanted his speech writers to use words with fou r letters, sentences with four words, and paragraphs with four sentences

Kennedy had a much better speech writer than I do.

Eloquence is the essential thing in a speech, not information.